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Hi all
A thought I've been mulling over recently. I use woven weed membrane and cardboard to mulch small trees, but I wonder if they're actually doing more harm than good? The weed membrane is supposed to be permeable, but as far as I can see, a lot of water runs off it rather than soaking through. (I don't tend to mulch all of the membrane, due to a lack of mulch). Cardboard is better once wet, but takes a fair bit of rain to get wet enough. Obviously there are gaps in the membrane / cardboard around the stems of the plants, but I try and keep these fairly small, and definitely not as big as the root area underground.
Do these coverings do more harm (limiting water) than good (limiting weeds)? Especially on small, non vigorous trees that grow slowly? Discuss?
One final point is that mice seem to like to nest under my weed membranes, which then encourages foxes to come and dig them out, thereby digging up my trees too!
Maybe I'll stop mulching and let nature do its thing.
A thought I've been mulling over recently. I use woven weed membrane and cardboard to mulch small trees, but I wonder if they're actually doing more harm than good? The weed membrane is supposed to be permeable, but as far as I can see, a lot of water runs off it rather than soaking through. (I don't tend to mulch all of the membrane, due to a lack of mulch). Cardboard is better once wet, but takes a fair bit of rain to get wet enough. Obviously there are gaps in the membrane / cardboard around the stems of the plants, but I try and keep these fairly small, and definitely not as big as the root area underground.
Do these coverings do more harm (limiting water) than good (limiting weeds)? Especially on small, non vigorous trees that grow slowly? Discuss?
One final point is that mice seem to like to nest under my weed membranes, which then encourages foxes to come and dig them out, thereby digging up my trees too!
Maybe I'll stop mulching and let nature do its thing.
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